Friday, December 19, 2008

Kind of Watching It DVD's: Someone Behind the Door/Lola

Oh hi. Would you believe I have about 6 Charles Bronson movie is my Sleepytime DVD arsenal? The staggering number comes from the fact that I have 2 sets of collections from Bronson. My latest acquisition came from a collection called Charles Bronson Collection Volume 1. There is no 2. There may not be a need.




Someone Behind The Door- 1972- This movie's a mess. Charles Bronson plays an amnesic victim who has the bad luck of getting Crazy Anthony Perkins as his doctor. Perkins does some wacky brainwashing type thing and puts Bronson's hapless ass character in the middle of a murder mystery. Why do I think this would happened to these two in real life too?





Together Perkins and Bronson make for the deadliest Odd Couple, ever. Evil Dr. Jeffries makes Bronson stay at his bachelor pad so he can further confuse him. Anthony Perkins was really good at playing slimy characters like this. Bronson ambled around like a Shemp-like presence and the comedy ensued. Of course Jill Ireland was here, she played Perkins's girlfriend and "The Stranger" thought she was his "wife."Brainwashing's good for you!


Dr. Jeffries Best Move: He put some sleeping pills in Bronson's Tang. Woo hoo! His legs were like rubber, that fool couldn't run away if he tried. In fact that jackass slept like a log even though Jeffries's house was a busy as Graham Central Station. Would you believe Jeffries made the formula for Ambien? He did...



Spoiler Alert: Crazy Jeffries had poor Charles Bronson kill someone for him. Bronson being the stolid acting presence he is was just there, not reacting. We never knew who Charles Bronson's character really was. But I'm going to take the necessary steps to piece together his biography for my sake. Sadly Dr. Jeffries is still practicing and totally has his own website. Showoff....

***


Lola- 1969
Despite his "deep" persona, Bronson always struck me as a guy who'd sign important contracts in crayon and with nothing but an X. Here Bronson plays (gulp) an American writer in love with a young British girl, played by Susan George. How young? 16? Yikes! We all know Bronson had acting difficulties but there was one scene where he was convincing. And that was it. The overriding theme in this was how hot Susan George's character was. She wasn't, in fact she was totally annoying as all 16 year olds are. To add insult to injury, Orson Bean played Bronson smart-alecky friend. No movie can take full throttle Susan George, Orson Bean and Charles Bronson. It was doomed!

The Big Lessons: There's a lot oddly enough. The biggest one here is perhaps the generation gap and the fact that Lola was basically deranged and a big crybaby.

The Verdict: This is ridiculous and despite that fact I cried during the last scenes. (Spoiler alert) They broke up! Waaahh!!!

**1/2 Dotched a notch for Lola's corny ass go-go boots.

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